Rosemount is a crossroads in the south of Westmeath, five kilometres north-east of Moate and a short run from the Offaly border. The village proper is the four buildings at the junction — the Catholic church of St Thomas the Apostle, the primary school, the community centre, and The Stile Bar holding down the corner. The older name for the village itself is Ballybrickoge, and you will still see it on a deed or a headstone. The land was once Geoghegan country, a stronghold of one of the Southern Uí Néill septs, and the GAA club at the crossroads has done well enough at senior level over the years to keep that pride pointed somewhere useful.
Anyone passing through is usually here for one of two reasons. The first is Knockastia — the hill that lifts out of the fields just north, one of the higher points in a county that runs mostly flat, with a Bronze Age cairn on top that a Harvard team excavated in 1932. The second is the Ballagh Famine Village on the road back to Moate, where an 18th-century chapel, a school and a public house stand roofless in a field above the line of a Famine road. Neither place has a car park or a coffee dock. Both reward a slow afternoon and a sturdy pair of boots. For dinner and a bed you go back into Moate, or down the road to Tyrrellspass; Rosemount is not in that line of work.
Three things every local will eventually mention. Read these and you've already understood more than most day-trippers do.
Cnoc Aiste rises to about 200 metres a couple of fields north of the crossroads — one of the highest points in Westmeath, which is not a county that hands those out lightly. A Harvard archaeological team dug a Bronze Age cairn on the summit in 1932 and lifted 44 burials of sixth-century date out of it.
About Rosemount → 02 Ballagh Famine VillageOn the road between Moate and Rosemount, the walls of an 18th-century church, a school and a public house still stand in a field, with the row of cottages roofless behind them and a Famine road from Black '47 running through. The Westmeath Archaeological and Historical Society walks the site for Heritage Week most Augusts.
About Rosemount → 03 The crossroadsRosemount is the four buildings at the junction — the Catholic church of St Thomas the Apostle, the primary school, The Stile Bar, and the community centre. The older name for the village is Ballybrickoge; you will still see it on a deed or a headstone.
About Rosemount →Moate to Rosemount is about 5 km on the local road north-east — ten minutes. Athlone is 25 minutes west on the N6 and the back road. Tullamore is 25 minutes south through Kilbeggan or Clara. Mullingar is 35 minutes north-east. The lanes around the village are single-track in places; meet a tractor and someone reverses.
No regular bus serves Rosemount itself. Bus Éireann and Local Link run through Moate on the Dublin–Galway corridor; from there it is a taxi or a lift. Plan to drive.
No station. The nearest line stops at Athlone (25 minutes by car) on the Dublin–Galway route.
Dublin Airport is 1h 20m by car via the M6. Ireland West (Knock) is 1h 45m. Shannon is 1h 30m.